Since product manufacturing and distribution facilities have a finite production and inventory capacities, planning for and managing customer orders and other requests is a fundamental activity performed by most manufacturing and distribution organizations. To better meet customer demand, a manufacturer may typically manufacture products before receiving customer orders. This production is typically based on forecasts of future customer demand. The supply of a product that is produced based on a demand forecast may be referred to as “available-to-promise” (ATP) supply. ATP supply consists of quantities of one or more products each having an associated date on which the products are scheduled to be available for delivery to a customer.
Once future demand has been forecasted, a plan to fulfill this demand (for example, using ATP supply) can be formulated by an appropriate planning engine. When an actual customer request is received, one or more promises may be made to the customer by a demand fulfillment engine regarding fulfillment of the request. The demand fulfillment engine typically has access to ATP supply information and can promise ATP supply to the customers to meet their demand. If a manufacturer or distributor is to satisfy its customers, it is often important that this demand fulfillment function be provided to the customers on a continuous basis without any interruptions in service. If uninterrupted demand fulfillment is not provided, a product manufacturer or distributor risks losing its customers to a competitor.